


1216

by verovex



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Ambiguous Relationships, Angst, Break Up, Character Study, Ever Prominent Lack of Communication, Getting Together, Hurt/Comfort, If You Look at it Sideways it's a Happy Ending for Someone, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, In A Universe Where Isabella Doesn't Exist, M/M, Negotiations, Non-Explicit, Season/Series 03, Self-Reflection, where 3x05 ends differently
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-02
Updated: 2019-06-02
Packaged: 2020-04-06 08:24:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,148
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19058902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/verovex/pseuds/verovex
Summary: Ed’s not sure what love is, but he recognizes what it means to have Oswald next to him on this couch and a little part of him wants what comes next even if it’s what neither of them expects.





	1216

**Author's Note:**

  * For [horrorriz](https://archiveofourown.org/users/horrorriz/gifts).



> Reposting purely for Riz to be indulgent af.  
> Title from this [song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdOifXvFq3U).

*

Some beginnings happen in police precincts, some endings happen at gunpoint. Neither Oswald or Ed were anywhere near the middle of their story, but they were at a peak of some sort, sitting with very little distance between them as Oswald coddled Ed in a manner Ed had only marginally received by a few.

Kristen Kringle comes to mind, from the time a bullet grazed his arm. This was far more intimate. Nearly surreal.

Where Miss Kringle had gone home at the end of the day, Oswald and Ed had gone home together, because, in a sense, it was his home too. Oswald had welcomed him here with open arms. They equally took advantage of one another’s company, not daring to recognize the loneliness for what it was before this point, now finally having someone to share ideas, schemes, gossip. An equal in mind and soul.

They’d talked to death about the evening’s events, Oswald’s worry still lining his face.

“I hope you know Oswald, I would do anything for you.”

Ed hadn’t expected Oswald to kiss him. They’re both fairly certain _Oswald_ hadn’t expected to kiss him. The tentative, barely there pressure against his lips was enough for him to realize it happened, but Oswald looked like he wanted to bury himself alive.

“Edward—I apologize. I don’t—I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“It’s fine.”

It was an awfully detached reply for present circumstances. Oswald hadn’t been particularly subtle about his appreciation of Ed’s presence. It seemed nearly inevitable they’d collide like this with no bridges to cross or barriers between them. He simply hadn’t imagined it to be so soon. He hadn’t been able to reconcile how to return Oswald’s affections yet, or if he even felt the same.

“We can chalk it up to residual adrenaline fuelled impulses,” Ed offers when Oswald’s downcast, thousand-yard-stare into the cushion is threatening to set it on fire.

“Alright,” Oswald says, voice smaller than anything Ed’s ever heard. _Impossible_ , Ed thinks, that someone perched so high could appear so low, for something he’s at fault for. Oswald was no fool, but he was a fool for him. Guilt knocks once, loud.

It becomes clear it’s not something they can ignore. Ed knows what’s at risk when you’re running in the dark, blind to outcomes. He also knows this is something he doesn’t want to lose.

“Alright,” Ed echoes, with a breath, “but if you wake up tomorrow and the impulse hasn’t gone away, I’d welcome another try.”

*

Ed rouses early next morning, throat still sore. Oswald has tea prepared, laid out on a tray outside his door. When he goes to thank him downstairs, he’s met with breakfast and a smile meant purely for him. Impulse hadn’t waned, not that Ed thought it would. A piece of him had hoped it would give Oswald the opportunity to back away on his own volition, realize there was more debris than useable parts with his Chief of Staff.

He takes off the borrowed housecoat from his shoulders, approaching Oswald from behind, presently leaning over an open manila folder against the kitchen island. He places the clothing carefully over Oswald’s shoulders and rests his hands there, pressing his thumbs down into multi-layered covered skin.

Oswald stiffens, prompting Ed to retreat until his back hits the fridge. Perhaps he’d been wrong after all.

Oswald twists around, skeptical of Ed’s thoughts or maybe his own, it’s difficult to tell. He tilts his head with a silent ask and Ed nods.

They meet halfway, robe lost to tile flooring. Ed reaches up first, hands clasping to cover either side of Oswald’s jaw. Oswald leans up as Ed leans down and the tentativeness of last night is replaced by assuredness and a dash of desperation as their lips meet, feverish. Oswald clings to the loose cotton of Ed’s white sleeveless tee.

They come apart, breathless, Oswald’s glossy eyes bring a chuckle out of Ed as he moves his hands from Oswald’s face to wrap them around his shoulders, pulling him close.

“Regrets?” Ed asks. He can feel Oswald’s smile against his chest.

“None at all.”

For Ed, unease sits thick in his throat despite subsequent distractions.

Ed doesn’t have much exposure to touch. It’s easy to display the role of someone who’s had a different upbringing, or more thorough experiences (the glamour to save face with Miss Kringle was a prime example), but sometimes the sensory overload of someone thinking he deserves to be touched causes a panic deep at his core. Oswald wants to touch him, so he does, he matches Ed's movements the best he can, but it leaves behind a looming worry.

Everything is rushed and thrown to the wind when Ed lets him in, and he's barely cognizant to register any of it by the time everything is done and they’ve collapsed upstairs in the master bedroom. He doesn’t know what to pull enjoyment from, especially when Oswald’s insisting they cuddle, and it short-circuits something in Ed’s brain. He’s up in a flurry, picking up all the pieces that had come undone from his clothing, rushing out the door with multiple whispered apologies.

Ed stays in his room, door locked for nearly sixteen hours before emerging. He shouldn’t have left. It makes him nauseated, thinking about how Oswald had been so ecstatic, enthusiastic, starved and then satiated, and Ed had ended it on such a sour note.

Love seemed important to Oswald in a way Ed didn’t grasp, but after spending all day curled up in bed, he’s started holding on to a foolish hope that Oswald could teach him this too. Oswald had been surrounded by warmth, a mother who doted on him, a father he eventually received care and love from too. Oswald stressed the importance of aspirations, having someone to share his legacy with. Having someone was a disconnect from darker tempts. Something to make him human.

Oswald had been built in a structure that already had a foundation, Ed had been poorly assembled in a wet and broken environment.

Oswald’s long gone to bed when Ed raps his knuckles against his door. He wants him to be awake. He hears something that sounds like _yes_ and crosses the threshold into a pit of vulnerability. He knows there’s still confusion nestled in his chest, but for tonight he needs to make amends. It’s another uncharted step.

“This is new for me,” Ed says at the side of Oswald’s bed, he notices the sheets have been changed from earlier. Navy now instead of violet.

Oswald pulls himself up to rest against the bed frame, “me too.”

“I care for you, Oswald. Deeply.” He doesn’t need to clarify anything, it sounds like he’s doing it more for himself. A little bit like a lie to subdue the shame.

Oswald grins, pats the sheets next to him as an invitation. Ed shakes his head. Self-hatred grows from how Oswald’s smile falls.

“There are things I need to figure out for myself, which might involve us taking this on a more unorthodox route,” he clarifies. It does nothing for Oswald’s expression. “It’s hard for me to sleep in your bed.”

“You don’t have to,” Oswald says, it immediately soothes Ed’s troubles. _This is fine._ “Your comfort and safety are what’s most important.”

“Okay.”

*

Ed wants affection, from all avenues. The attention, devotion, validation, to be reminded of his worth. Oswald provides it, without prompting. Ed had ideas, could fill a library full of them. Was happiest when he found acceptance of his mind from others; sometimes it felt like the only thing that gave him any semblance of self-value.

Oswald showed him this wasn’t true. There was more. Ed was mountain peaks and beyond, edges and ridges, valleys and craters, depths unexplored.

They remained in office until it wasn’t feasible, when the city was torn apart by plagues, viruses, and explosions. There was more progress to Oswald being a figurehead of the underground populace, the lounge an appropriate front for operations.

People died or rose from. Time passed in a manner that suited Ed, while he assisted Oswald with many aspects of a lustrous career, he worked on his own too. Discovered what it meant to be the Riddler from his various hideaways around the city. Ego bruised, but still laughed with Oswald about the _Chess Killer_ headline, lamented about his desire for more, brings out Riddle Factory like it’s suitable night-time entertainment at Lee’s bar in the Narrows.

Shines bright with Oswald in the nosebleeds, might shine brighter when he’s not there at all.

Always returns home, elated and enthralled, enticed by Oswald’s warmth, succumbs to primal desires, fights off the lingering warnings that he’s satisfied far more by being the _Riddler_ than in being fucked. Ed always leaves after, leaves Oswald’s sad smile behind after saying goodnight to sleep alone in a bed that feels much too big for all that he still can’t be.

This thing between them, a catalyst, a fire that burned at either end, was a harsh contrast in the dark of Gotham. They never really know what to call it, or maybe Oswald did, but Ed couldn’t. Strangers, friends, compatriots, peers, roommates, rivals, equals, saviours, lovers, partners. It wasn’t easy to land on one singular descriptor, nothing was adequate. Perhaps it provided beauty to this, to never truly understand what lay beneath them. Or, it was just an excuse never to define it. To never acknowledge it was too much of too little from one party.

Still, some nights when Oswald says _‘stay?’_ Ed sees how much this means to him and realizes it’s particularly infinitesimal to himself. There are aspects to this where he’s an active participant, intimacy preferred when it involves kissing for a needed distraction, hugs when Ed feels like everything is deteriorating in his mind, snuggled up on the couch when he’s hit a wall with progress. Sometimes Ed stays to bury himself against Oswald's chest, after dissociating heavily from previous events, but only until his chest starts to hurt and he leaves.

Why can’t he just stay? He thinks about it a lot, at breakfast, at lunch, at meetings, in the middle of conversations. He thinks about it at dinner, after Olga takes away their plates.

Oswald reaches out while he’s deep in thought, Ed flinches. Oswald reels his hand back, small sad smile at his lips, “you have risotto on your lip.”

Ed ignores his own reaction, “oh, thank you.” Ed grabs for his napkin, edging it along his lip. “Good?”

*

Sometimes Ed remembers what it’s like not to be loved. What it’s like to feel as if there’s a hole carved out of you and you’re not sure how to fill it. Oswald had been there, ready and prepared to suture it closed. No questions asked. He’s been loved so strongly now, Ed hadn’t wanted to be the burden of a person to say he couldn’t return it. That he didn’t have the capacity for any of this.

He’d only ever been capable of fear and self-loathing, there’d never been room to love someone properly because he had never understood what it meant to love himself.

Oswald had never wanted to fix him, it’s what made them sustainable. It’s what made the light shine from one side when it had been entirely dimmed on Ed’s.

Ed’s always distant, detached, cold. Oswald’s always warm, present, attached. Ed knows he and Oswald are near equal in intelligence, just in different regards.

So, it becomes hard to believe Oswald doesn’t see it. Doesn’t see how one-sided this is. How Ed doesn’t make long-term plans. Oswald talks about the future like Ed’s around every corner. Ed never does. Only talks about the minutes to come, the next day, or week. Never years. Never a lifetime. Sometimes Oswald shrugs it off, laughs when Ed’s blunt about not getting married, or having a space to escape for himself. He still needs an apartment in his name only, even when Oswald puts Ed’s name on _everything._

Oswald uses pet names, Ed only gets as far as saying Ozzie, endearment easily sung in a different key, nowhere near a love someone should have after so long.

When Oswald reaches to put his arm around Ed’s waist in public, Ed finds something to draw his attention to across the room. Maybe Oswald looks hurt, but he doesn’t see it. He knows it makes him terrible. He knows they should’ve never crossed into this plane. Knows Oswald had always been in this with _F O R E V E R_ as a background soundtrack.

Ed was always one foot out the door, high on alert, fight or flight always set one way.

*

There’s a definite sensual attraction that comes from being in Oswald’s space, in his embrace, in his care. Ed doesn’t know what to compare it to, other than how he’s never had anything like it before. Oswald is attentive, displays it in a way that Ed knows no one else is privy to.

When the doors close, Oswald takes him apart piece by piece, holds his hand if that’s all Ed wants, lets him cling and burrow against Oswald’s neck when he wants to cry for no reason at all. Soothingly runs his hands along Ed’s body to remind him what’s real. A tender kindness that leaves Ed’s heart cold because when Oswald needs it in return, Ed isn’t programmed to know how to do so. Ed’s constructed a home only Oswald seems responsible for filling half-way, and he only knows how to pay back the debt he’s accrued by offering his body as payment.

He’d rather only one aspect of this, everything that’s not sex. He’s so incredibly selfish.

Physical intimacy has always been a task rather than a pleasure. It tends to be the hardest part of the relationship. Initially, there is very little experience between both of them, not that this fact is what makes it problematic.  _Making love_ is a wretched expression. There’re overtones to it, expectations, layers to unpack. In layman’s terms, it could be broken down to a vapid need to serve a bodily function. Other times, his mood decides he needs pain for it to be okay. There is no in between. It’s empty, fake, as is everything else involved with this arrangement.

It’s how Ed needs it in a way that Oswald can’t provide. Either he doesn’t need it at all and he’s filling in this role between them, or he needs it to make him forget his own name. It’s a giant disparity between them. Ed tries, claws at Oswald in attempts to say _I need you to do this to me too._

Oswald hisses from the dull pain of Ed’s nails in his back but never reciprocates. Unspoken communication had always been easy between them, except when it came to this. Ed doesn’t know how to put it into words. Oswald wants it soft, loving, slow. Ed doesn’t think he deserves any of that. It’s near a year before he says anything, when everything is horribly domestic, and it regularly makes bile seep into a spot at the base of his throat. Oswald’s reading the paper, Ed’s moving eggs side to side on his plate.

“I need more.”

Oswald is taken aback, eyebrows crinkling closer together, mouth twitching in confusion. “I don’t understand?”

He doesn’t know how to broach this, he thought he did, now he wants to turtle in on himself.

“Ed?” Oswald tries, throaty. He probably thinks this is the final curtain call, Ed doesn’t want the _relationship_. It’s probably one of Oswald’s chronic concerns.

“In bed.” Ed finally says, voice small, feeling like the expanse of the dining table between them was growing insurmountable.

Oswald’s mouth twitches again, more visibly relaxed. Still on edge, considering they’d never found comfort in talking about this before. “More, how?”

“I need it to hurt.”

It’s a drastic shift. They set boundaries. They have a code. Oswald has always been putty to Ed’s whims, this is no different. He’d be anything Ed needed. He’d do anything for him. It was _lovelovelove_. Terrible, trembling-inducing, terrifying type of love from one side. It wasn’t fair. Guilt knocks twice, vehement.

Ed wonders how cruel this makes him, taking advantage of Oswald to satiate a thirst that stemmed from a failed youth. He wonders if he's less human. Evil, monstrous, ill-equipped to ever be the other half. Dancing in a game that would never have a victor.

Ed stays the first time, after having Oswald’s hands around his throat, now huddled with Oswald around him, a dire need to provide a reward for catering to him.

“I’d set the world on fire for you,” Oswald whispers, running a hand across Ed’s shoulders, and eventually settling on his mid-back before falling asleep next to him.

Whether or not Ed was asleep is his secret to keep.

*

Ed thinks it’s love because there’s nothing else to tell him otherwise.

He thinks it’s love because it’s different than Kristen.

He thinks it’s love because he’s never felt loved, not in the way Oswald gives it.

He thinks it’s love because it can’t possibly be anything else, and it’s what he doesn’t deserve.

It’s textbook. You have all the pieces, you line them up, they fit, click, complete. If it’s all logical, who is he to refute it? Perhaps the evidence is more stringent on what he’s been led to believe, rather than allow himself to evolve his shaky understanding.

If love is reliant on mutuals: compassion, care, closeness, communication, compatibility, then yes, they tick various boxes. But when some components make Ed feel like he’s living in a masquerade, then what’s the point? If it feels forced, how is it happiness, let alone love? If the purpose of love is to be all-encompassing, selfless, indulgent, then how come he doesn’t feel that way?

Ed thinks about miswiring, how at some point his brain gave him intellect but sacrificed passion where people usually experienced it.

Sometimes when he pushes Oswald, he wishes Oswald would be cruel with him, the way he is in a guarded type of way with everyone and everything else. Wishes he'd finally get rid of him, tell him all of what’s wrong with him, validate the things he already believes, assumes, feels.

Oswald didn’t _need_ him.

Sometimes Oswald told him otherwise, would ask Ed if he was allowed to feel the way he did. Said it was overwhelming to love him the way he does and hopes it doesn’t scare him.

This power Ed had, brings unrest. It makes him wonder how much longer this will last. It reminds Ed about all the ways Oswald would say he only had one true love, his suffrage an unmistaken, invisible burden. This unfulfilled affection that clustered itself like a scab that would never heal. It was a crushing responsibility.

It felt as empty and nausea-inducing as the mansion was, filled with haunted illusions, of battles fought, of wars lost, graves dug, emotions buried.

*

Ed’s recollection of how he became friends with Lee _after everything_ is blurred and skewed, but he’s endlessly grateful for her forgiveness and tolerance. Queen of the Narrows is a title not to be taken lightly, even if most of Lee’s work is done in the clinic, she’s an integral asset to the conglomerate known as Oswald’s crime syndicate.

Her honesty is always the highlight of Ed’s visits. He needs it tonight, because it’s been five years of disjointed memories with Oswald, and he’s been given an ask he should’ve known was inescapable.

“Sometimes I wish we could talk about my problems for a change,” Lee half-jokes, grabbing the bottle of Jack from over the bar to pour into two glasses.

“Are there?”

“What?” Lee’s brows furrow, glancing around the nearly empty venue, until her eyes land on Barbara. She lifts one of the glasses, canting her head towards it.

“Problems?” Ed turns as Barbara approaches, who takes the glass quite happily and gives Lee a kiss in thanks that lasts a lot longer than necessary.

“The only problem we have is of the green bean pole variety,” Barbara says with a forced smile directed at Ed before escaping with her drink in hand. From across the room, she shouts behind her, “say hi to Pengy, would you?”

Ed fiddles with the umbrella in his drink while Lee takes up the bar stool next to him, nudging him lightly. “So?”

Ed hesitates. Was this a secret he wasn’t supposed to share? Was it too personal? It shouldn’t feel like this, Lee is his friend, they’ve discussed worse. He exhales, “Oswald asked about marriage.”

“Asked about marriage or an actual proposal? Those are two very distinct events.”

“It was more of a question of when he thought I’d be comfortable with it,” Ed pauses, considers downing the drink just for the burn. Already hears Lee saying, _that’s a sipping whiskey, don’t be rude._

“And you said?” Lee’s tone is soft and reminds Ed of gentler eras.

“Nothing,” Ed replies, lifting his glass to glance at the wayward ice cubes at the bottom. “Your staff need to learn how to use less ice,” Lee kicks his barstool. “I didn’t know what to say to him. I left and came here.”

“What bothers you about it?”

“I don’t need an object or a piece of paper to tell me I belong to someone else.”

“You make it sound like a life sentence.”

“Isn’t it what you have with Barbara?”

“No, Babs and I have a pact,” she points at the ring on her finger. “We sleep in the same bed. We don’t fall into a self-hatred spiral when we have sex, and we don’t dream about leaving. There’s a difference.”

Ed releases a billowing sigh, pushing the glass aside and stretching his arms out across the bar before settling his chin on the arm closest to Lee.

“You two being married doesn’t take away your independence,” Lee continues.

“Doesn’t it?”

“He’s not eating your soul, Ed.”

If you’re supposed to learn from how you’re taught, all Ed’s been taught is how marriages are an excuse. An excuse not to leave when you should. An excuse to stay because a piece of paper tells you to. An excuse to tell your son he’s the only one keeping the marriage together, and how if they never had him at all, maybe they would’ve been happier because at least they could’ve been apart.

Marriage has always been flaunted in front of him like a vestibule of guilt. Negative connotations have always been more prevalent than positive ones.

“You realize no is an option, right?” Lee asks.

“Of course.”

He does, later. Tells Oswald he’s not comfortable with the concept, reminds him he’s told him this before, how they’re fine the way they are. They don’t need to put such an explicit label on it. Ed’s grown accustomed to the permanent impression of sadness behind Oswald’s eyes.

*

“Do you ever go to visit your parents?” Oswald asks during a lull between them. It really didn’t need to be filled, let alone with such a poor topic.

“No. They’re dead,” Ed says, deadpan, eyes never leaving the gazette.

“Where are they buried?”

Ed knows Oswald is fishing for the opportunity to take him there, so they can mourn together.

“Somewhere along the Hudson River, I’m sure.”

Oswald drops his spoon with a clang against the saucer, Ed peeks over the newspaper to see him stutter over unsaid words before settling on, “I see. Does that—”

_—_ _bother you, do you miss them, are they_ _—_

“I was six the first time my father put my hand in a bowl of scolding soup and said it was for looking him in the eye. I was eight when I went head first into a glass window pane for thinking it was okay to answer the phone. I was eleven when he beat me with a belt for being two minutes late for curfew. She just watched,” Ed gently lays down the newspaper over his bowl of oatmeal on the dining room table. “So, no, I don’t care about how they were gunned down at a gas station off I-87 when they left me alone at fourteen to go on a vacation. I only regret I didn’t get to do it myself. I’m sure if they’d stuck around longer I would’ve,” Ed folds the newspaper, tossing it towards Oswald. “Today’s Politics might interest you.”

Ed thinks about all the moments he wished he’d never been born. All the times he’d been told how much his parents wished the same thing. How it had forced marriage between two people who’d only fucked for entertainment and neglected the responsibility of it. He thinks about all the times he’d been forced to stay hidden in the cold closet of his parent’s room when they had company, told if he wasn’t silent he would have to worry about where to store his tongue. He thinks about how he never had a room for himself he could hide in because his parents had him sleep on the couch.

There had never been a safe space.

Anger is always Oswald’s brightest emotion, it makes Ed’s heart swell. “You should’ve been treated better.”

“Can’t change that now, can we?”

“No, but someday I hope you take what I am offering you to heart, so we can mend what they broke.”

“Some things are irreparable, Oswald. Don’t get your hopes up.”

Oswald doesn’t speak until hours later, to say goodnight when Ed leaves a room that isn’t theirs, even though they share enough to make it so. Guilt knocks thrice, tired.

*

“Why does it have to be Oswald and that’s it?” Lee asks, pushing the cherry around in her glass with a black straw. “If you can’t give him what he needs, or vice-versa, why don’t you both get it elsewhere?”

“Like break up?”

“If that’s your first instinct, yes,” she shrugs. “But, people have plenty of successful relationships without following some normative construct.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Love can exist without sexual desire, Ed. It makes it no less powerful or significant.”

“Oswald wants more than what I can give him.”

“How is he supposed to know that if you don’t tell him?”

Ed glances around the room, “it’s been so long, I’ve wasted so much of his time.”

“It’s normal for people’s feelings to change. You’re self-aware enough to know this is a problem, why continue prolonging it?” Lee can tell he’s closing off, it’s not her intention. “Do you know what platonic love is?”

“In theory, I suppose.”

“You enjoy Oswald’s company, correct?”

“Yes.”

“Who’s to say that after you two initially get over this, you can’t still have that type of love?” Lee presses, Ed rolls his shoulders. “Life’s too short.”

“Why can’t I give him what he needs?” Ed asks, croaky and a hint of rhetorical.

Lee sighs, leans over to wrap him into a hug, “you aren’t broken, Ed.”

It grows quiet between them. Being told you’re one thing when your brain has all these methods to tell you otherwise, ends up not being as helpful as he wishes it was.

*

Oswald could live with a sexless relationship, it wasn’t something compulsory between them, and he feels guilty about Ed ever thinking so. It’s when Ed says, _‘I love you, I’m just not in love with you’_ that makes Oswald backtrack. He wasn’t telling Oswald their relationship could continue without sex, he was telling him the relationship couldn’t continue at all.

Oswald _knows_ , the rational part tells him so, the bit that says this isn’t Ed’s fault. It wasn’t a choice, just a fact of life: Ed was who he was, and nothing Oswald said, tried, did would change this outcome.

Lines in the sand which had once connected them were long washed away. This desperate need between them had evolved and changed, what only remained was their significance to one other. Recognizing this _thing_ they have—had, was never going to be enjoyed or endured by being drawn out. Life would move on, memories of what they once shared were set in stone, and no one could take them away.

It didn’t work. Simple. It was no one’s fault.

Oswald couldn’t go back in time, rewrite this, he didn’t have the right to. Ed trusted him, in Oswald’s eyes was selfless in giving Oswald what he wanted, despite his own discomfort. Oswald was equally selfless in indulgence and waiting but expecting someone to change who they are at their core was a burden of damage no one should carry. It didn't stop him from being angry.

“How did we even get to this point?” Oswald asks to the room.

“I don’t know.”

“How could you let me—why did you let me think this was real?” Oswald’s voice is strained, low, questioning with his hands on his chest, eyebrows knitted together, eyes watering. “Why did we have to get this far?”

“Because I thought it _was_ real. I thought I’d adapt.” Ed _hates_ this, hates the excuses the most. The bubble of self-resentment grows in his stomach, makes him think maybe this is a mistake, maybe he should’ve let it be, let Oswald believe in the role he had perfected. He should’ve tried harder.

Oswald slams his fist onto the table next to him, Ed flinches.

“I know you’ll never apologize and mean it because it’s who you are, but how many times did you tell me you loved me when it hadn’t been true?”

“I _am_ sorry, Oswald. I do mean it.” Ed says.

“Answer the question.”

“Of course I love you,” it’s desperate, Ed lurches forward on habit, wanting to comfort him because it’s been nearly ten years, they were still so important to one another, there was still love left from history, an unfathomable connection. He stops himself before he gets too close. “But it has never been in the way you needed me to, the way someone else can give you.”

Oswald scoffs and gives way to the laughter growing in his chest, echoing loudly around the room. Ed grimaces. Perhaps Oswald doesn’t believe him. His laughter dies abruptly, as he eyes Ed through renewed composure, a wall clear as day between them now.

“I knew it, you know. Around the time where you forced yourself to sleep in my bed that one night. Still I...” Oswald hesitates with a sharp intake of air.

“Then why did you let it continue?” Ed asks when he doesn't finish his thought. Ed still needs it to hurt even when it’s not behind closed doors, even if it's in words, it’d be nice to know if Oswald was capable of being honest towards all of Ed’s insecurities.

“How could I not?” Oswald asks back, sombre. “I’ve always been a fool for you, Edward Nygma.”

Ed wishes it had been worse. Wishes there was cruelty. This would be so much easier if he didn’t see the world in Oswald’s eyes when he looked at him. “This would be easier if you hated me for this.”

“I could never hate you,” Oswald closes the distance between them, gripping Ed’s arm, tone light. “Besides, I believe you already hate yourself enough for the both of us.”

It’s a terrible truth, even worse when you hear someone else say it. Ed thinks about everything they share, everything that’s been given in his name. “What do we do now?”

“We give it time. I think distance is best,” Oswald lets go, Ed immediately misses the warmth. “You still have your headquarters, you can live there. Nothing else changes.”

“Why?”

“Time has not taught me patience, but it has given me the ability to know when to concede. I’ve always known I was at war with your greater demons,” Oswald’s eyes glisten as he turns away from him, tracing the edge of the table with his fingers. “I don’t believe my love for you will ever change. Before we can find ourselves as friends again, I need to accept that you’ve always viewed this differently than I had.”

“We can still be a part of one another’s lives?”

“Of course,” he replies immediately, then shoulders hunched, “not yet. One day. I still need time.”

“I’m sorry, Oswald.”

Oswald finds him again, always conscientious of Ed’s needs despite being tear-struck, places his palm against Ed’s cheek. “Don’t apologize, Edward. This is not your fault. Nor mine. It just happens.”

*

Ed spends a fair bit of time considering his choices after the fact, staring at the high ceilings of a freshly acquired older apartment.

It’s not so much about Ed wanting to be with any _one_ person, Ed doesn’t care for the longevity of a relationship. It’s an anomaly, he knows this. He wishes someone had told him earlier, how being with someone didn’t mean forcing it. How sometimes we don’t end up with anyone at all, and that’s okay. Because he’s always loved his work more, he’s loved the projects that spur joy from purpose.

It doesn’t mean he doesn’t miss being physically close with someone, or doing things ‘couples do’, but he doesn’t need to be in a relationship with someone to have that. He’s slowly meeting people who think the same way he does, people who’ve been closeted in a different regard. Feeling constrained by the normative restrictions on partners and what’s deemed as loyalty.

Ultimately, he feels fuller with heists, labyrinths, and tepid alliances.

He still misses Oswald. Lee’s told him to text her when he feels like this, but he doesn’t want to burden her.

Ed knows this type of emotion will pass, but it doesn’t deter him from wanting to pick up the phone. To hear Oswald’s voice. To have this unparalleled support no one else has given him. Everyone else, they come and go, but love or not, Oswald had been a tether in the dark.

*

It’s half a year of no contact later—no deliberate or accidental run-ins at parties, no high-paid tails to watch each other’s every move, no paying for Sirens' intel—before they ever see one another again.

It’s Ed who sees him first, coming down the main hall of Wayne Manor with enough of a presence to bring a loud room to murmurs. The subtle eggplant velvet of Oswald’s jacket brightens under the lights above him. There’s a glint of ruby from the stickpin on his checkered tie. Ed swallows.

Maybe everything’s only gotten quiet to Ed only, since he can’t hear Selina remind him about the coordinates for the fifth time, not until she punches his arm, giving Ed a shake. Everything zones back in, including hearing Oswald’s laugh, high, mighty, arm linked with the individual next to him. Ed’s lost to wondering who he is, if he treats Oswald right, if this is the first time they’ve been out in public together, if this is supposed to hurt as much as it does.

He knows he has no right. Oswald had made him his whole world, now he wasn’t even a blip on his radar. He shouldn’t be this off-put by Oswald being with anyone when he knows anyone else is better.

Still, Ed thinks about what he had. He feels selfish again, an anxious pit cultivates, makes his lip quiver. Reminds himself that being with Oswald had only left him with hatred for himself and had made the other melancholic. This was for the best. He knows this. Everyone does.

Oswald turns, eyes locking on Ed through the archway that leads into the dining room.

Ed immediately feels self-conscious, knowing he’s not dressed nearly as extravagant as Oswald is. It doesn’t suit him, a dull green suit with a simple black tie. Selina’s request for going incognito, or he couldn’t be a part of her plan at all.

Oswald smiles, dipping his head in a small nod. There’s a flicker of sadness, and even from thirty feet away, it travels through the sea of party-goers and sits on Ed’s chest like a brick.

Ed tilts his head in the direction of Oswald’s partner next to him, hoping to convey the ask. Oswald nods again, smiles, warmer, brighter, and wraps an arm around the stranger, glancing away from Ed in favour of staring fondly up at his companion. It was Ed’s answer.

Maybe the brick on his chest is threatening to crush his ribs now, but it’s okay. Because Oswald looks happy, happier in a way Ed could never make him. It’s a confirmation Ed will never be able to rely on Oswald the same now. It makes it especially hard to breathe. Oswald is free from Ed’s chains and as pained as he is, Ed doesn’t resent him for it.

Oswald doesn’t look his way again.


End file.
